María Paz Rodríguez was born on August 8, 1981, in Santiago, Chile. She studied Literature and earned a Master’s degree in Hispanic American Literature from the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile.

She made her literary debut in 2011 with her first novel, El Gran Hotel (Editorial Cuarto Propio), which received widespread critical acclaim and was awarded a Literary Creation Grant from the Chilean Book Council. In 2015, she published Mala madre with Alfaguara. The novel led to her participation in the “Latinoamérica Viva” panel at the 2015 Guadalajara International Book Fair, as well as an appearance as a guest of honour at the Lima Book Fair. Mala madre is currently in its third edition.

In 2018, she published her first short-story collection, Niñas ricas (Alfaguara). As in her previous books, Rodríguez developed a pop aesthetic shaped by feminism and an exploration of the complex position of women in contemporary Chilean society. The book brought her work to a wider readership and went through two editions in less than three months.

In 2015, she founded the publishing house Neón Ediciones, where she continues to work today. The press has published authors including Pola Oloixarac, Paulina Flores, Carmen García, and Francisco Ángeles, as well as Spanish translations of works by Mary Shelley, George Eliot, Henry David Thoreau, and others.

She currently teaches in the Master’s Degree in Creative Writing at Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez and has served as a jury member for several literary competitions, including Antofagasta en 100 palabras, Iquique en 100 palabras, Nuevas Letras Sub 30, and Mujeres Protagonistas. Arca, her fourth novel, was published in Chile by Tusquets in 2024. On July 18, 2026, Seix Barral, an imprint of Grupo Planeta, will publish a new edition of Mala madre.